McCain on Choice: Title X and Counseling on Abortion
After a little break, we’re back to John McCain’s anti-choice record.
John McCain, an uber-conservative (for those who still think he’s in any way pro-choice) voted to permit federally funded Title X family planning clinics to decline to counsel women on abortion services.
Title X family planning clinics have served as health care facilities for typically young and low-income women for 30 years; one of the most-recognizable Title X clinics is Planned Parenthood, which makes up 14 percent of Title X projects. Their goal, as health care providers, is to educate women in this country on how to be safe when it comes to sex, avoid unintended pregnancies, and make education and services readily available to the women who need them.
These clinics offer a wide range of information and health care to women who need their services. They offer birth control, emergency contraception, literature and testing for sexually transmitted infections and diseases, education on how to prevent unintended pregnancies, pregnancy tests and screenings for breast and cervical cancer. The best thing about these clinics, in my opinion, is that absolutely no one is turned away from receiving the health care and/or education they need because of inability to pay.
Since Title X is federally funded, a law has been placed in Section 1008 of the law saying that Title X funds cannot be used “in programs where abortion is a method of family planning.” In other words, Title X funds cannot be used to provide abortions. However, Title X projects must offer women neutral and factual information, non-directive counseling and referrals upon request for all of their pregnancy options, including prenatal care and delivery, infant care, foster care or adoption and abortion.
Senator John McCain voted in favor of Title X projects not even counseling women on abortion, as if the option didn’t even exist anymore. If you are pregnant and go into Planned Parenthood, a reproductive health care facility located in a hospital, which make up six percent of Title X projects or health department, 57 percent, and are seeking information about your options as far as pregnancy or not going through with your pregnancy, John McCain voted to make Title X projects refuse to even bring up the option of abortion. In his eyes you have two choices–you are either delivering and raising the child or delivering and giving the child up for adoption.
It’s no secret that McCain wants to abolish reproductive freedom for women, but to insist of closing the door on even the thought of terminating pregnancy is ridiculous. It is saying that McCain, along with the rest of the anti-choice brigade do not believe in women. They do not support or even like women unless they are in their place and doing what the conservative agenda believes is right. They do not trust women to make informed decisions about their own bodies but would love to force them into delivering and raising a child that they are either not ready for, in a matter of financial stability or mentality, or simply do not want. But we went over the reasons for this in the last McCain on Choice post. The more low-income children born to low-income mothers or families, the more future troops we have to carry out our world domination agenda.
Report IT Rally for Victim’s Rights
I’m a little late in posting this, which I apologize for. I’ve known about this for a little while now and until I received an email from Angela Shelton, I remembered that I needed to write about this.
1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime.
Angela Shelton, Wendy Murphy, Angela Rose and PAVE have teamed up and created the Report IT campaign.
Sex crimes are the most under-reported crime in the US.
It is widely known that more than 80% of sex crimes go unreported and when they are reported, the victim is re-victimized by the police department as well as the juror or jury if their case makes it to court. In effort to shatter the silence that revolves around sexual assault and raise awareness about the amount of sex crime cases that go unreported, the Rally for Victim’s Rights will give survivors the voice and unity in their neighborhoods to demand justice for survivors of sex crimes.
Gather at your local court house with other survivors, friends of survivors and anyone else you can get to get themselves to their local court houses to say that survivors of sexual assault deserve a voice and justice! Report IT’s Rally for Victim’s Rights will take place in dozens of city court houses across the country on February 19 at noon.
For a list of cities already participating in the rally check after the jump. For a toolkit to hold a rally in your community, email info@pavingtheway.net and they will send you all the tools needed!
Everyone knows someone who has been sexually assaulted.
But February 19 is only the beginning!
While the Rally for Victim’s Rights starts on February 19, this campaign will turn into a nationwide state-to-state protest on April 29, which is Angela Shelton Day!
McCain on Choice: Low-Income Women
The Republican agenda, as we have seen during Bush’s eight years in office, is to benefit the wealthy and screw the low and middle classes. McCain, who is even more strict right than Bush is no exception.
McCain has repeatedly voted to deny low income women access to abortion care except in cases of rape, incest or life endangerment.
You may be thinking to yourself–”Well, that doesn’t make any sense. If the right purely cares about the wealthy, then why would they care what even happened to low income people?” Well, the answer really is quite simple. All parents obviously want the best for their children, that’s a given. In most cases, parents want their children to live a better and even more fulfilling life, which in almost all cases, means a college education and a good job. The difference between the classes means that while one class can afford to send their children to the best schools for the best education in hopes of getting the best jobs, the other class simply lacks the funds. So what are those teenagers who dream of college and the best jobs they can get going to do?
That’s right–Join the military! If we do not give low-income women access to abortion, they will then have the child, raise the child, and once that child turns 18, they turn into property of the US government.
No abortion, more troops for future wars.
McCain on Choice: Anti-Choice US Supreme Court Nominees
The Supreme Court, the highest judicial body in the United States is the highest form of office in the United States (besides the president) when it comes to putting legislatures into effect that the US people must live their lives by. When nominating people into the US Supreme Court, it is crucial to put people in office who are going to treat their jobs with respect and on a basis of what is good for the people.
Senator John McCain voted in favor of four anti-choice US Supreme Court nominees. Women’s right to choose is under attack. In 2007, Roe experienced a very hard year with 11 different bans on abortion being introduced to states legislatures and anti-choice initiatives being fought to appear on state ballots. With anti-choice people in the Supreme Court, we are only looking at harder times for Roe. We are looking at the agenda of anti-choice as a whole and the looming threat of women’s rights as we know them.
The people sworn into the US Supreme Court hold their position for life, so what we are looking at is swearing pro-life people into our Supreme Court who will base their control over our laws on personal opinions, religious beliefs and their anti-choice agenda before all else.
On May 3, 2007 during the Republican debate, John McCain said:
“I’m proud that we have Justice Alito and Roberts on the United States Supreme Court. I’m very proud to have played a very small role in making that happen.”
We must stand up for our rights as humans, the right that women were given to choose and have control over their own bodies and reproductive systems and tell John McCain that while his strict anti-choice agenda is apparent, we will not go back to the time before 1973. We will not go back to unsafe, back alley abortions and clothes hangers. We will not go back to the time when women had no rights over their own bodies and we refuse to let him, a man who is considered a senior citizen at his 71 years of age and has and will never be pregnant or have to make the personal and very difficult decision of whether to have an abortion, push his anti-choice agenda on the people of the United States.
McCain on Choice: Unborn Victims of Violence Act
The Unborn Victims of Violence Act was signed by President Bush on April 1, 2004. The Unborn Victims of Violence Act is a law that grants separate legal status to unborn fetuses and embryos and defines them as being a legal victim if injured or killed “at any stage of development in the womb.”
Anti-choice leader, Samuel Casey had this to say about the law:
“In as many areas as we can, we want to put on the books that the embryo is a person…That sets the stage for a jurist to acknowledge that human beings at any stage of development deserve protection – even protection that would trump a woman’s interest in terminating a pregnancy.”
What the Unborn Victims of Violence Act does is protects a fetus under any circumstances whatsoever and places that fetus’ rights above the pregnant woman’s rights. According to the Bush administration as well as anti-choice groups, a woman has no rights if she is pregnant, she is then regarded as an incubator and baby machine, reverting back to the years before women had the right to choose, which is unacceptable in a society where we are still under the impression that we have a come a long way. The rights that she had now support her unborn baby over her and the law sadly recognizes an embryo as a person rather than the actual person. (For state laws on this act, click here.)
NARAL Pro-Choice America President Kate Michelman in response to the Unborn Victims of Violence Act ruling said:
“The anti-choice movement, from President Bush on down, has insisted on using the issue of punishing violence that harms or ends a pregnancy as cover for its campaign to undermine a woman’s right to choose.
There’s no disagreement on the horrific nature of violent crimes against a pregnant woman that harm or end her pregnancy, and the need for harsh penalties against those who commit such terrible acts. The pro-choice movement is committed to the fundamental right of every woman to act on her choice to have a child and bring new life into this world when she chooses to – and we oppose any attempt to deny them of that right, whether by anti-choice judges or violent criminals.
In other words, anti-choice leaders have turned consensus into contention because of a provision that does nothing to punish any criminal or protect any pregnant woman, but is part of a long-term effort to erode Roe v. Wade.“
Senator John McCain supports and voted in favor of the Unborn Victims of Violence Act and has also voted in support of “almost every important pro-life law proposed in the last decade.”
Sex-Positivity
I'm passionate about sex-positivity and believe every sexual being should have the freedom to explore their sexuality safely and without condemnation. I even lost my ad network after my refusal to censor myself after reviewing feminist porn.So if you're in the market for sex toys, porn, books, etc. take a look at the retailers below, all of which are feminist-friendly.
Out Campaign
The OUT Campaign allows individuals to let others know they are not alone. It can also be a nice way of opening a conversation and help to demolish the negative stereotypes of atheists. Let the world know that we are not about to go away and that we are not going to allow those that would condemn us to push us into the shadows.
